PHILADELPHIA — When last seen onstage in Philadelphia, Michelle Zauner of Japanese Breakfast was dressed as Saruman, the white-bearded wizard from "Lord of the Rings," on Halloween night in 2023. The band was closing out the tour behind its album "Jubilee" at the Fillmore.

Now, the author of the bestselling memoir "Crying In H Mart" is coming to back to Philly for a show at the Met Philly on May 16 in support of an ambitious new album titled "For Melancholy Brunettes (& sad women)," which is due on the Dead Oceans label March 21.

Zauner made the album, her fourth, at the fabled Sound City studio Los Angeles (where Nirvana, Tom Petty, Fleetwood Mac and many others have recorded) with producer Blake Mills, who has worked with Bob Dylan, Fiona Apple and Alabama Shakes.

The album’s first single is “Orlando In Love,” which draws on Italian Renaissance author Matteo Maria Boiardo’s epic poem "Orlando Innamaroto." A lyric video for that song is out now.

Zauner, who graduated from Bryn Mawr College and started her indie band Little Big League in Philly in the early 2000s, vaulted into the mainstream with the runaway success of "Crying In H Mart," her heartbreaking memoir about grief, food and her Korean American identity written after the death of her mother Chongmi. The H Mart in the book’s title is in Elkins Park.

The book is being made into a movie directed by Will Sharpe, with screenplay by Zauner. Its success gave a boost to Japanese Breakfast, with the band garnering two Grammy nominations in 2022, including best new artist.

That breakthrough into the mainstream inspired the introspection of the new album, which a press release describes as “an intricate, contemplative work that conjures the romantic thrill of a gothic novel.”

“I felt seduced by getting what I always wanted,” Zauner says in the release. “I was flying too close to the sun, and I realized if I kept going I was going to die.” The 10 track album explores “the perils of desire” and features a surprise guest: actor Jeff Bridges, who appears on the song “Men In Bars.”

The Met Philly concert will be Japanese Breakfast’s second biggest Philly show ever, topped only by the sold-out Dell Music Center benefit for Connor Barwin’s Make the World Better foundation in 2022.

The tour begins with performances at the Coachella Music and Arts Festival in California on April 12 and 19, and the Met Philly show, with indie synth-pop band Ginger Root opening, is the final date on the band’s initial North American tour. Then the band heads to Europe in June.

Ticket go on-sale through artist presales on Jan. 8 before becoming available to the general public at 10 a.m. on Jan. 10. Ticket information is at japanesebreakfast.com/tour.

Here’s the track list to "For Melancholy Brunettes (& sad women)"

1. “Here is Someone”

2. “Orlando in Love”

3. “Honey Water”

4. “Mega Circuit”

5. “Little Girl”

6. “Leda”

7. “Picture Window”

8. “Men in Bars” (feat. Jeff Bridges)

9. “Winter in LA”

10. “Magic Mountain”

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